Honey Locust Sangha
Omaha Community of Mindful Living
  • Home
  • Our Practice
    • Weekly Meditation
    • Monthly Half Day of Mindfulness
    • Days of Mindfulness
    • Annual Retreat >
      • Retreat Sign Up
    • TNH Quarterly Video Series
    • Monthly Calendar
  • Practice Resources
    • Gathas (Mindfulness Verses)
    • Beginning Anew
    • The Five Remembrances >
      • November 2022 CTC Minutes
    • Mindful Breathing (Meditation 101)
    • Touching the Earth
    • 5 Contemplations (Eating Meditation) >
      • August 2022 CTC Minutes
      • CTC Minutes April 24 2022
    • 5 Mindfulness Trainings (Guidance for Mindful Living)
    • Deep Relaxation
    • Meditating with Difficult Feelings
    • Peace Treaty (A Practice for Dealing with Anger)
    • Outdoor Walking Meditation
    • Indoor Walking Meditation
    • Meditation on No Birth, No Death
  • Articles by Thich Nhat Hanh
    • The Heart Sutra
    • Flames of Prayer
    • March 2021 CTC minutes
    • On Reincarnation
    • Mother Earth Is Inside Of Us
    • Walking Meditation
    • The Story of a River
    • Why Do We Have to Die One Day?
    • Impermanence
    • Poem: In Praise of Mother Earth
  • Dharma Talks by Some of Our Teachers
  • Sangha Musings - Poems, Prayers, Reflections
  • Videos
  • Christian/Buddhist Dialogue Articles
    • Richard Rohr- Unitive Consciousness
    • Thich Nhat Hanh- Home is the Way: A Christmas Message
    • Paul Knitter- God/Love: the compassionate energy of the interconnecting spirit.
    • Katherine Fransson- Eyes of Thich Nhat Hanh
    • Mike McMahon- An Introduction to Christian/Buddhist dialogue
    • David Stendl-Rast- A Catholic Monk Practicing Buddhism
    • Thich Nhat Hanh- The Holy Spirit and Mindfulness
    • Thich Nhat Hanh- Going Back to Our Religious Roots
    • Anthony de Mello, SJ.- Conversations with the Master
    • Mike McMahon-A Lotus Blooming in the Catholic Church
    • Mike McMahon- Buddhist Approach to Doctrine (Teachings are relative truth)
    • Joan Chittister- Practice Compassion and You Will Become It
    • August 2022 CTC Minutes
    • Notes from Thomas Merton's Asian Journal
    • Paul Knitter
  • Caretaking Council
    • February 2023 CTC Minutes
    • January 2023 CTC
    • December 2022 minutes
    • November 2022 CTC Minutes
    • October 2022 CTC Minutes
    • August 2022 CTC Minutes
    • July 2022 CTC Miinutes
    • June 2022 CTC minutes
    • April 24 2022 CTC Minutes
    • April 10 2022 CTC Minutes
    • March 2022 CTC minutes
    • February 2022 CTC Minutes
    • January 2022 CTC Minutes
    • December 2021 CTC Minutes
    • November 2021 CTC minutes
    • October 2021 CTC Minutes
    • September 2021 Minutes
    • August 2021 CTC Minutes
    • July 2021 CTC Minutes
    • June 2021 CTC Minutes
    • April 2021 CTC Minutes
    • February 202CTC Minutes
    • January 2021 CTC Minutes
    • November 2020 CTC Minutes
    • October 2020 CTC minutes
    • Sept 2020 CTC minutes
    • January 19, 2020 CTC Minutes >
      • November 2022 CTC Minutes
    • October 2019 CTC minutes
    • September 2019 CTC Minutes
    • August 2019 Caretaking Coucil
    • March 2019 Caretaking Council Minutes
    • October 2018 CTC minutes
    • September 2018 CTC minutes
    • August 2018 CTC Minutes
    • July 2018 CTC minutes
    • April 2018 CTC Minutes
    • January 2018 CTC Minutes
    • November 2017 CTC minutes
    • August 2017 CTC Minutes
    • July 2017 CTC Minutes
    • May 2017 CTC Minutes
    • April 2017 CTC Minutes
    • March 2017 CTC Minutes
    • September 2016 Minutes
  • Adventures in Buddhist/Christian Spirituality
  • Sangha Directory
  • March 2023 CTC Minutes
CTC Minutes, February 21, 2021
ALL PRESENT: Patrice Watson, Facilitator; Dave Watts, Gina Matkin, Jim Cox, Juanita Rice (Note-taker), Mark Watson, Mike McMahon.
We proceeded as usual with a short meditation period, a check-in, and the facilitator's reading of the "Meeting Prayer" which you can read separately under CTC reports.

Agenda Item One: "Inclusiveness Resources."
Gina and Juanita reported for the second month in a row that we had not yet progressed significantly, that we had resources, suggestions, lists, in a loose grab-bag, but had not yet found a time to meet and give better shape to our intentions.  The general discussion that followed was somewhat visionary, as in helping the CTC envision the project, and resulted in enlarging the project committee to include Mike, Dave and Jim.  The facilitator announced that we had better come up with something achieved by our next meeting or we would be excommunicated from Buddhism.  
We invite the sangha to contemplate the seriousness of this dictatorial threat.  Just kidding.
Once Gina and Juanita posed the problem as one that needed the input and the enthusiasm of the CTC in general, and eventually at-large sangha members, the discussion became intensely animated.  Gina agreed to try to convene five-member committee to work on the project after our wide-ranging discussion that included some of the following ideas:
Develop a vision of the world we want to facilitate. Possibly the societal changes that we want to see that would eliminate arbitrary isolations of people from each other's lives, segregations of communities and individuals because of social prejudices of the past, between races, ethnicities, classes and differently gendered groups or individuals. And why we, as a Plum Village Buddhist group, should engage in realizing that transformation, i.e. the centrality of Bodhisattva aspirations: "Aware of the suffering" and dedication to "relief of suffering" of ourselves and all beings. That might take the form of a progression from   "Our Aim" or Our Wish, the position now, and how to walk in the direction of the aspiration. And that the mission, or the direction, should be a LIVING document, brought regularly to the sangha for consideration, an evolving document, a responsive document. 
Suggestions of ways to begin suggested, at least in part, being responsive to the "Contemplations on the Five Mindfulness Trainings" communicated to us by Valerie Brown and Marisela Gomez of the Plum Village ARISE Sangha.
 *ARISE = Awakening through Race, Intersectionality and Social Equity.  

The project committee will share ideas and enthusiasm and negotiate times and ways to communicate.
Their report is scheduled for the March 21 CTC meeting agenda.

Agenda Item Two:  Membership in Care-Taking Council. 
Our by-laws specify that the Council shall be composed of six to nine members, drawn from the Order of Interbeing, Aspirants to OI, and at-large sangha members.  We previous invited applications from the sangha for up to two more people.  The qualifications are regular attendance at sangha over the last year and having taken the Five Mindfulness Trainings.  Two people applied, Tina Ray and Mike McGann.  We opened the subject for discussion and voted to accept both applications as long as they still had the interest and ability.  
Results will be announced at Sangha Monday night, February 22.  
There are also two applications of possible  but postponed qualification and interest from the past which will be kept on record in case the applicants resume active re-application.  This gives us 3 OI, 3 Aspirants and 3 at-large members.  We will consider rotation as availability changes. And fills our 9-cube Zoom window.  

Agenda Item Three: Spring Retreat with Brother Michael Ciborski.
Mark Watson confirmed that Brother Michael would be the Dharma Teacher at the Spring Retreat to be held Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, May 14, 15, and 16th which is the third weekend, and the weekend after Mother's Day.  The retreat will be a distance event via Zoom.  
Gina volunteered to help Randy Reinhart, Honey-Locust Treasurer, with registration for the retreat, and 
Patrice and Juanita will work with Mark Watson to make plans.  Brother Michael did not specify a theme so the committee will generate some suggestions.  
There is also a limitation we could run up against: Brother Michael is widely well-known and could conceivably "draw a crowd," depending on the way we go about publicizing.  "A crowd" could bring in solid income for Dana, but there are two caveats. 
A.  The Zoom account for the Sangha  has an attendee limit of 100.  Although an additional Zoom fee might enlarge that limit it is also true that using "Break-out Rooms"—that is, smaller groups that can share more intimately, for Dharma sharing, generation of ideas, etc.—requires dedicated time and attention by a 'HOST.'  That host would be significantly limited in their ability to experience the retreat with everyone else.  
B. We shared a perception that, especially in the absence of person-to-person meetings and retreats, the sangha (and we automatically include the Lincoln Sangha) needs and would benefit from keeping the number of people lower—perhaps 40-60.  If we publicize widely, the first wave of registrants might exclude numbers of our sangha.  The sense of the meeting was that we need to make sure everyone from "our" sangha/s gets to register, perhaps before opening registration more widely but with a limit. 
We concluded that money for Dana was not a primary objecct. And a corollary of the two considerations is that we need to make every effort to get early registration from Honey Locust Sangha and Lincoln Sangha.

This meeting adjourned around 2:30. 
Notes submitted by Juanita
The Honey Locust Sangha / Omaha Community of Mindful Living is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. All funds donated help to fulfill the mission of practicing and raising awareness of the mindfulness practice in the Thich Nhat Hanh / Plum Village tradition.

​You can donate (provide Dana) using the PayPal link at the left (you do not need a PayPal account) or send via Venmo to @HoneyLocust. Please indicate General Dana or specific event (December DoM, for example) in the text via Venmo.